


blink of an eye and all the problems solved

by brandywine421



Category: Daredevil (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Defenders (Marvel TV)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe, Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Claiming Bites, F/M, M/M, Mating Bond, Mild Blood, Multi, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Pack Bonding, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-10 21:53:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18669094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brandywine421/pseuds/brandywine421
Summary: "Some people didn't go anywhere, just paused for 5 years.  Other people spent 5 years in other worlds.  The wrong worlds," May said, taking a long sniff of the coffee before taking a sip with a pleased smile."Your nephew?" Matt asked."Have you seen the news?  I'm doing my best to be patient but the strangers living in my apartment threw me off my game," she admitted."But here's Matt with his place still completely intact," Frank said from the couch."Foggy's brother didn't get dusted and he kept our apartments paid up.  Foggy's awesome.""Is he all right?" Jessica asked, toweling off her hair and eyeing Matt's coffee."His girl has wings now, I think?" Matt hesitated.May nodded.  "Yeah, there's a whole winged group, and some with gills and webbed feet they're trying to round up.  Then there's us."





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Man. I have a lot of feels. Like, shit, you know? I can't even - I just can't. I try to work on my WIPs and then I remember - it's just a **lot** right now.
> 
> I need to think about something else, so fuck it. Here's a twist on the whole snap thing - it might not make sense at first but stay with it - we'll be back to normal in chap 2.
> 
> *ETA - shit, this is for Marvel Bingo square 'abo'!

_Let's all go play Nagasaki_   
_We can all get_ _vaporized_   
_Hold my hand, let's turn to ash_   
_I'll see you on the other side_

 

 

"I'm an O. Put me in the harem."

"You - "

"Yeah. Devil's still dead and this is my piece of the puzzle."

"I can't protect you - "

"I don't need your protection, I need you to get me in. You've got your own piece to worry about."

"The trio - oh, we had it all wrong."

"Just the way we need it."

 

* * *

 

"I don't like it, it's too long - too soon."

"Too late. We got our jobs."

 

* * *

 

"Word is you added a new O to the stable."

"Yeah, his A got locked up and bargained a safe landing for it."

"What, they knock a few months off his time if he loans his O out for - "

"Careful, Boss. Think before you speak out of turn."

 

* * *

 

"Mouth and hands only, they run a clean op."

"I don't even know what to say to that - look - "

"That's a little difficult, buddy. Do you - shit, do you know what day it is?"

"1421."

"Damn. Thank you. Do you have any messages for me?"

"So many, everyone is scared as shit right now - "

"Does that count as a message?"

"The elixir's supposed to start working soon, does that mean anything to you?"

"Oh yeah."

 

* * *

 

"Ladies and gentlemen, if you're ready. Let's begin - slice and dice."

 

* * *

 

"Em, please?"

"Nah, Fam, not it."

"They want an O to do it."

"I'm bad at public speaking."

"Didn't you say you were a lawyer - "

"Zip it. I'm still on the job, I'm waiting for my signal."

"Whoa, you mean there's a whole plan?"

"I didn't give everyone knives and synchronize an attack by myself - I'm smart, but that takes more than one brain."

"But what do I tell them - "

"It's just the Alphas, right? Wait until the Betas turn up and we'll think about coming out."

"Wait, you - we don't wanna know, do we?"

"Now you're getting it."

 

* * *

 

"Date?"

"1792."

"Close enough?"

"1825 is a rough estimate, you guys - "

"Honest to God, I stopped counting ages ago - I just needed the rest of the plan to work."

"Please stop touching me when I'm trying to think."

"No."

"And we're sure the water's working?"

"They're dropping like flies, but we can't take it for granted."

"You know I don't do well outside of - "

"Em. Take one for the team."

 

* * *

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

_Let's go ring and run the bunkers  
_ _Baby won't you come outside?_   
_Across the sea the birds are free_   
_Let's watch them scream across the sky_

 

* * *

 

  
He sat down on the couch and strummed his fingers across the familiar fabric. He raised his socked feet to the coffee table, leaning his head back and sniffing the air. The breeze through the broken windows held a hint of honeysuckle from somewhere far away. He wasn't going to think too hard about it. He earned this. Home. Finally fucking home.

He enjoyed it without counting the seconds or monitoring the shifts in movement outside - just taking in Hell's Kitchen, five years after he left it.

He had to take his moments. This could work. It was enough.

The shrill ring of the wall phone completely ruined his moment but it had been a while since he'd heard it and he found it in the same place he left it.

" _Matt_?"

"Foggy. You all right?"

_"Yeah, I guess you found your place intact, too?"_

"How's this work?" Matt asked.

_"You - I - shit, my family handled everything, I was your next of kin, they're mine - I'm figuring it out but they kept our stuff current. Can you just stay there until I figure stuff out?"_

"How's Marci - is - "

_"She's got wings - I can't talk about it yet, I'm still figuring - just - stay put, I can't worry about this many things at once."_

"Fog," Matt said quietly.

_"I love you, too buddy, but I have about fifteen more tearful calls to make and I can't handle your emotions up front - save it for my call back."_

He could handle that. He hung up the phone and went to reclaim his moment on the couch.

His couch.

He should probably be thinking ahead, thinking about the next step. Did his friends have homes to go back to? Was the world the same one he left behind? No, it couldn't be the 'same', he wasn't stupid.

He inhaled and tried to settle.

It had been so long since he'd been able to fall asleep without fear.

 

* * *

 

He woke up instantly when the couch shifted but didn't have a chance to panic before the scent filled his senses. "Jess. Frank?"

"Heya, Red."

Jessica's fingers skimmed over his clothes. "Can I?"

"No, don't, he - doesn't have to - "

Matt laid his left hand out and turned his wrist, the jagged lines of the knife Frank used before they knew how the Bite worked. He closed his eyes and tried not to whimper when Jessica sank her teeth into the flesh of his shoulder and blood spiked the air.

Home usually smelled like blood but he'd enjoyed the breeze. Frank's teeth were sharper but the pain dulled as Jessica's spark slowly bled into his system to meet Frank's. The bond hummed low and burst through his world on fire with a thundering bass drop.

"Thank you," Jessica whispered into his neck, wrapping both her arms around his bicep and clinging to his side. "I'm gonna need a little time to deal with shit."

"Who you telling?" Frank grunted.

"Later. I just want to sit here a bit longer," Matt said.

"You all right?" they asked together.

"All that time, I just wanted to go home. Now I'm here, I feel like I should appreciate it."

Jessica shifted her feet onto the couch. "Your phone is ringing. How do you even have your same apartment? Or a phone?"

"I'm more worried that you don't hear it," Frank said, cupping Matt's face gently and smoothing back his hair.

Matt hummed. "I hear it, just don't care. You need a place to stay?"

"Yeah," they both answered.

"You're going to have to stop doing that," Matt smiled.

"You realize you've been purring this whole time, right?"

He raised his hand to his chest and focused on his newest modifications. He hadn't calculated on balancing another 'sense' but the Omega - and the bonds - were still here.

Frank strummed his hand through his hair again. "You don't have to stop."

He was home, but it was never going to be the same. "I'll get the phone, can one of you get the door?"

 

* * *

 

"Some people didn't go anywhere, just paused for 5 years. Other people spent years in other worlds. The wrong worlds. Ancestry.com is going to have a field day figuring out what alien race people are related to - if that's how the spread of dusted souls was determined," May said, taking a long sniff of the coffee before sipping it black and hot with a pleased smile.

"Your nephew?" Matt asked.

"Have you seen the news? I'm pretty sure he's upstate with the Avengers, or maybe Africa - I'm doing my best to be patient but the strangers living in my apartment threw me off my game," she admitted.

"But here's Matt with his place still completely intact," Frank said from the couch.

"Foggy's brother didn't get dusted and he kept our apartments paid up. Foggy's awesome," Matt said, predicting another question about how he had the same place. 

"Is he all right?" Jessica asked, toweling off her hair and eyeing Matt's coffee as she left his bedroom. He seemed to know it and slid the cup over to the empty seat and took a fresh mug for himself.

"His girl has wings now, I think?" Matt hesitated.

May nodded. "Yeah, there's a whole winged group, and some with gills and webbed feet they're trying to round up. Then there's us."

Matt went to the door before any of them heard the knock. May noted Jessica taking Alpha posture immediately - not Frank like she'd believed previously - he hadn't moved from the couch. Jess caught May's look and shrugged, shaking off the instinct.

"Force of habit," Jessica murmured.

"Dude! Good to see you, buddy - seriously - we're going to have a long, extensive talk soon because I've been spending your money for five years and Foggy's going to kill me."

"Theo. I have guests, come in, here - " Matt returned with a box in his arms and a plumpish balding guy on his heels. "This is Foggy's brother, he held down the fort."

"Sure, but like, my parents and the Mahoneys helped. And your money - dude, you left us like, all your money - " Theo started up again, setting down the boxes.

"Not my money, not really, I don't want to talk about that now. What's in the boxes?" Matt asked, sliding his hands over the cardboard until Jess caught his fingers and tugged him back to sit on the stool.

"May Parker, nice to meet you, Theo," she smiled at the curious man and shook his hand.

"Awesome. New phones, Foggy said to bring as many as I could get at the store so you get eight. Also, a TV and new computer so you can watch the news but it's not a fancy blind one because they totally didn't have that at the store," Theo said. "I can't stay but you might have more guests - Ma's been taking a lot of messages for you. Anything you want me to pick up on my way back from Foggy's?"

"Go see your brother - he's my lawyer, you can tell him all about the money if you want," Matt said, impulsively pulling the guy into a hug. "Thank you."

"Oh, wow, sure thing, buddy. That's what family's for," Theo replied, squeezing him tightly. "Get those cell phones working and text me. Wait - what did you guys get?"

"What are our choices again?" Jessica snorted into her coffee.

Theo scanned Matt, holding him by the shoulders. "Don't see wings or fins, oh no, did you get the sexy cat one?"

"Sexy cat?" May repeated.

"Huh, it makes sense, you always were kind of sneaky and slutty - no offense, wow - Fog will have to explain it. Mrs. Sessions out on Merrick got an actual fish tail, like, she's making it work but - you got lucky," Theo shrugged. "I think Karen's got wings, she's my next stop - so the phones are a priority."

"On it," Jessica said and May held up a half-opened box.

"Someone's bringing you food at some point - Mom's going to need a head count so don't go anywhere. No Daredevilling until you talk to Ma, all right?"

Matt flinched. "Is that common knowledge now?"

"Just in the family, we've been holding down the fort, remember? The Devil built the fort," Theo said flatly. "You have your job."

 

* * *

 

"You should bite him," Jessica said, snapping May's attention from watching Matt fumble through his aged clothes with Frank carefully spot-checking his selections for washing.

"Pretty sure that's not how it works," May replied.

"It would make you pack. You don't have to fuck him, that's our job," Jessica said. Matt tilted his head toward her, curious but she ignored him. "We're going to offer the same thing to Nelson - make sure our new 'thing' doesn't make us vulnerable. You don't want to accidentally go into an Alpha rage around your kid - if you're bonded, it won't be a possibility."

"He's not your property to just offer up," May hissed.

Jessica held up her hands. "Relax, you really think we didn't talk about it first?"

"Then don't act like it's just a transaction," she snapped.

"May," Matt called from the couch. "It's not like that. We're moving out of survival mode and into triage."

Jessica caught her attention and lowered her voice. "None of us know how all 'this' is going to affect our lives here. The bond saved our asses over there and now that it's safe and we're home - it's yours if you want it. Okay?"

"Just keep it in mind, Foggy's bringing someone up," Matt announced. He tugged a frayed sweatshirt from Frank's hands and shoved it over his head with a petulant expression. "I'm keeping this, fuck the stains."

She held her breath when the lock fumbled and opened. "Your aunt's a boss bitch and don't let anyone tell you different," Foggy announced, walking in with a wiry kid still smudged with dirt and a nun.

May forgot about her five years in hell and wrapped her arms around her kid. "Where? Where were you?"

"Um, space. Then I was at the battle - I got the 'blink'. You - where were you?" Peter asked with widening eyes rimmed with fatigue.

"It doesn't matter right now - Em - "

"Bedroom's yours, whatever you need," Matt responded before she finished her question and she ushered Peter away from the people he didn't know.

"What the heck happened, Aunt May? Mr. Stark - he's - "

She held him as tight as she could and tried to remember how to pretend that everything would be okay.

 

* * *

 


	3. Chapter 3

  
"Matt. _Matthew_." Sister Maggie reached out and covered his hand with hers. Jessica and Frank snapped to attention and spotted the stray tufts of stuffing from the couch cushion. "Do you hear something?"

He wrinkled his face in confusion. "Wings?"

Foggy hopped off the kitchen stool and headed for the roof stairs. "Marci and Karen, luckily you have high ceilings so they can come inside."

Maggie carefully studied Matt's claws for a moment before patting the top of his hands. "Daredevil will have to test out different ropes so he doesn't rip them apart."

He smiled. "Thank you for coming."

"Thank you for coming _back_ ," she said, softly. "You were missed."

"I should probably ask what happened, shouldn't I?"

Maggie brushed away the mess from the pillow. "Pretty sure you're in shock, but that'll pass. Just keep doing what you're doing, Anna and I are setting up camp here for a bit. Is that okay?"

"When did you make friends with Mrs. Nelson?" Matt asked blankly.

"You were gone five years, Matthew," Maggie said. "Life moved on and some of us had trouble letting go of the missing. Your neighbor passed away and we picked up her lease, and a couple of others in the building from your 'fund'."

Foggy hushed her immediately but Matt was distracted by the tears he scented from the newest guests. "Karen, Marci - what - "

"We can't fit in the taxis, God, it's good to see you - " Karen yanked him into a hug and - **wow** \- she had a wingspan on her.

"How did you guys get _wings_? What the hell is going on?" Matt asked, turning to accept Marci's less hysterical hug.

" _Are we doing the hugs now? Let me through -_ " Anna Nelson arrived with what smelled like freshly made food - not military rations or the strange alien 'treats'.

"What's _that_ face all about?" Karen asked, linking elbows with him.

"Sister Maggie says I'm in shock so I don't need an excuse," he replied.

"You got Frank and Jess, too? Lucky bastard," Karen said.

His apartment was suddenly so full and warm with laughter that everything felt wrong again.

Was it a lucid dream or those goddamn hallucinations - no, this was real, they - _everyone_ \- everything -

"Yup, that's shock all right, let's everyone have a seat and we'll have a nice group catch up session. Who else is here, honey?"

He reclaimed his seat on the couch and left the answers to his friends. He didn't think Mrs. Nelson would hold it against him.

 

* * *

 

There were a lot of people in Matt's apartment when she opened the bedroom door. The Sister from earlier stepped into their path and Peter let out a small squeak.

"Hello, any allergies or preferences? You're just in time for dinner."

"Hi, I'm Peter."

She smiled kindly. "I'm Sister Maggie. Matthew's my son."

"Oh," May said. She embraced her immediately. "It's great to meet you. Matt talked about you a lot."

"Make yourselves comfortable, we're expecting a few more displaced people before we can start the questions and answer session," Maggie said. "I'm thinking we should have brought name-tags."

May steered Peter to the couch and she saw the wings up close that she'd been watching on the news. Frank grinned at her from the couch with Matt and Jess. "May was unlucky enough to spend the past few years in our little pocket of hell. I'm Frank."

Peter blinked at him. "You're the Punisher."

Frank laughed softly. "Been a long time since anyone called me that, but yeah. I used to be."

"You still have outstanding warrants? Is that something we need to - " Foggy perked up with worry.

"We'll figure it out later. Where were you?" Jessica waved him off.

"He got the blink treatment, didn't lose any time," May said. "Thank God."

"Amen."

"Where did you go? I mean, Aunt May said they got dosed with alien DNA, were you on a different planet?" Peter asked the blonds with the colorful wings.

"It looked like here, at _first_. I think it was the same for your Aunt. The alien DNA makes sense, all I know is I was at work, taking notes with Foggy and then I was in a field with these huge-ass wings."

The other blond nods. "Same with me, I was having drinks with a client and then * **poof** * I'm a parrot."

"Pretty sure you're an oriole, Karen's a blue-jay," Maggie hummed.

"Aliens called us something else - but they wanted us for feathers - to make us pets," Karen frowned.

"You didn't tell me that, Marci," Foggy said.

"They were fucking huge, you're talking about pulling off this whole revolution and we were being chased by giants with butterfly nets," she threw up her hands.

"Really?" Peter gasped.

"No, she's being dramatic. They didn't have nets," Karen said.

 

* * *

 

"Danny's got fins and gills, no tail though, he's pretty disappointed about it," Matt said, head lolled back with his eyes closed when Misty and Luke approached the couch at the nun's invitation.

"You okay there, buddy?" Misty smiled faintly, looking down at him.

"He's been napping a lot, but he seems okay," Jessica answered, running a knuckle down his cheek.

"He can't answer for himself?" Luke asked sharply.

"The _fuck_ is your _problem_?"

Foggy whistled. "Everybody take a breath and remember that we're not in the Mirrorverse."

"Is that a reference that I should know?" Matt yawns, flexing his hands in a grabby gesture.

Foggy swatted him with a blanket. "You're not helping - we are not sexy cats - they are not birds - Danny is not a mermaid - we are all regular people and we're going to act like it. Understand?"

Matt ripped the blanket into strips of cloth and hissed low and feral. Foggy bopped him on the head and he stopped, going lax against the couch again.

Foggy sighed. "I need him functioning at Lawyer Level, not ' _underground hybrid spy for the resistance_ ' level, okay? Stop making him think about the other place, he needs to be here now."

The kid popped up from between May and Maggie and peered at his aunt. "You were in the resistance?"

"May was our super-secret weapon," Foggy replied without looking away from Matt. "Smartest woman in our 'verse."

Peter beamed at her. "Yeah?"

"It's not that serious - it's just - _chocolate_ ," May said.

Matt smiled. "More than chocolate."

Misty offered her hand to May and elbowed Luke to follow her lead. "Thank you, for getting us out of that place before we actually got out."

"I'd like to know more about the chocolate," Luke said.

May shifted nervously and glanced at her kid.

"Hey, I just had my first battlefield experience, nothing you tell me will be more upsetting than that," he smiled at her. "Right?"

"We can eat chocolate but it's poison for dogs," May said softly. "All I did was try and find something that we could eat that would be poison for the aliens."

"And fix the fertility thing, don't forget that part," Matt called. Foggy was sitting with him now, frowning.

"It was just - a combination of herbs, you know? Stuff I have - _had_ \- growing in my window garden," May said.

"You can't even cook, Aunt May - that's awesome," Peter lit up, throwing his arms around her.

"They put it in the water, made the O's eat the stuff three times a day and once all the Aliens started getting sick, we made our move," Foggy picked up. "We couldn't have done anything without your aunt's brains."

"They kept me off the main board, which is what the Avengers should have done with you," May said to Peter, pointedly.

"Wings on the roof," Matt said.

"That must be Ms. Walker," Maggie said easily. Jessica stiffened. "Don't pull that face at me, go say hello."

Despite her scowl, she took the stairs two at a time.

"What was the fertility thing?" Maggie asked May quietly. She patted Peter's head and motioned for him to go get her phone. He scurried off and she turned to the Sister.

"They wanted to repopulate, that's why they changed our DNA," May said. "But it didn't work, they couldn't breed with us or make us breed as hybrids. Women stopped menstruating, and all the men were sterile when we managed to run tests."

"Six months after they seeded the water table, the females restarted their cycles and at least three ladies from the camp were expecting. Won't know if the babies come out normal or not for a few months," Misty said.

"Sounded normal," Matt murmured from the couch.

May let out a hysterical laugh. "Forgive me if I don't trust your ears as much as an ultrasound."

"Just means you don't know him well enough," Luke said. "I trust his ears more than all of my own senses."

"Do you know their names so we can check on them?" Maggie asked, slightly alarmed.

"He went by 'M', he didn't tell anyone his real name," Misty answered.

May smiled to herself. "We know their names. Told them to keep their heads down if we got back in case the government tried to take them for experiments."

"Smart thinking," Maggie nodded.

"I can make some calls, I mean, Tony's gone but Dr. Hulk and War Machine both gave me their numbers," Peter said, returning with a phone.

"Later. They have a lot to deal with, I'm sure," May said.

"Maybe, but I'd like to talk to whoever gave us the ' _1825_ '," Misty said.

"1825 what?" Peter asked.

"Days," Matt yawned. "It was like everyone had a dream with that number."

"Five years," Foggy said, nudging Matt gently. "What is wrong with you?"

"I'm _very_ tired but people keep talking about things I need to listen to," Matt replied.

Jessica stomped back into the room with Trish Walker - **wow** \- a real celebrity - with wings but still - _famous_. She flopped onto the couch, glaring at Foggy. "Back off." She draped an arm around Matt and pulled until he was curled up with his head in her lap. "Sleep, Asshole."

"You won't pay attention, where's Frank?" Matt grumbled, but tucked the fresh blanket provided by Foggy around himself.

"Running your errands, remember? Sleep, he'll be here when you wake up," Jessica said. "Everybody shut up for, like, ten seconds."

May glanced at Maggie who shrugged. About five seconds in, the purring started and Peter looked at her with slight betrayal. "You said you didn't know why they call you sexy cats on TV."

"I don't know who added the 'sexy' adjective, but there are some feline...similarities," May admitted.

Peter frowned and turned to Trish. "Do you chirp or lay eggs now or is it just the wings?"

"Oh, wow, rude - and no - but I possibly can talk to birds," Trish said after a beat. "Pigeons are assholes."

"Shit, I was hoping Marci was making that up," Foggy sighed.

 

* * *

 

Anna and Maggie made their quiet check around the apartment early the next morning. It was a sign of how exhausted everyone was that no one had pulled the curtains to hide the forever-lit billboard through the window.

Most of the 'cats' were piled in Matt's bed, Luke and Misty on the edges with Matt, Jessica and Frank in a tight bundle in the center. May and Peter were sharing the couch and at some point, the kid had spun hammocks out of web for the winged crowd so Foggy was suspended with Marci off to the side with 'beds' for Trish and Karen nearby.

"I guess they made it work," Anna murmured. "I'll start the coffee."

"Check to make sure they don't have a pool set up for the merman somewhere," Maggie smiled.

Peter slipped from the couch and padded over to them in Matt's oversized clothes. "Morning. I've got a couple of friends coming by, Aunt May said it was all right. And Mr. Rand came by earlier, his girlfriend was taking him flying but I told him that you were running the fund for the Dusted people that lost their homes and he promised to email you a bunch of financial stuff."

"That's what had Theo texting so early," Anna nodded. "Are you old enough for coffee?"

"I ate all the candy in the house. Metabolism, I swear," Peter confessed. "I can't have coffee unless I'm late for school. But I guess, I'm five years late for _everything_ so yes, I am absolutely old enough for coffee."

"Have you been awake long?" Maggie asked.

He leaned his head on the counter with maximum drama. "I'm, _sort_ of, in trouble, _maybe_ , for taking off after the battle, but I just wanted to find my Aunt, you know? And Mr. Stark - he was the only reason I was in on the whole superhero thing and now he's - I just needed to find my aunt."

"I'm sure they'll understand," Anna said. "Not that I know anything about that superhero thing, but some people do better at small scale heroics. Space couldn't have needed you as much as Queens - I'm sure they'll be glad to have you back."

"We're definitely glad to have Daredevil, wish we didn't need him," Maggie sighed. "But don't minimize whatever part he played in the big picture - those Avengers got our families home safe."

"I have so many questions about that and I don't trust the news," Peter admitted, wrapping both hands around the coffee Anna put down in front of him.  "Who's Daredevil?"

 

* * *

 

"I have very explicit instructions to 'take care of Queens' and seriously, kid, I'm from Harlem, what the hell am I going to do in Queens?" Sam asked, bumping fists with Peter.

"Parker, whose place is this?" Clint asked, glancing around the apartment with sharp eyes. He knew this place.

"Um, my aunt's friend?  I think he was a lawyer before all this," Peter replied in a stage whisper.

Clint knew that whispering wouldn't help around the Devil and he spotted him across the room. By the shift in the blind guy's posture - he 'spotted' him back. " _Murdock_."

Matt let out a slow breath and nodded his head toward the other room and Clint ignored all the weird looks and followed him.

" _Shit_ ," Matt whispered when they were alone, thankfully not needing Clint to say it out loud. "What happened to her?"

"It's a long story. It's - _shit_."

"Were you with her? Were you the last thing she saw - your face?" Clint shuddered and Matt grabbed his arm. " _Tell me_."

"I - " Fuck this intense motherfucker -

"She wasn't alone and she was with someone she loved - someone that loved her back - _that's_ \- she wasn't alone and she knew she was loved - **right**?"

"Fuck _you_ , Murdock," Barton choked out, twisting him into a hug that cracked his joints with force. "She wasn't alone."

Murdock twisted his hands in his shirt. "I'm glad it was you. _Fuck_ if I could live with it, still haven't gotten over Ellie - but you got people, got a life of your own - make her proud, fucker - earn that shit. You smell like war, have you even seen your wife yet? Go see your _fucking_ wife."

Clint laughed through a sob and leaned back to shake Matt roughly. " _Seriously_ , fuck you so much."

Sam knocked on the open door, openly concerned. "Everything all right? Natives are getting restless and like, we _just_ got here."

"Yeah, but somebody owes this asshole some R & R," Matt said. "I need a drink. Let's talk."

 

* * *

 


	4. Chapter 4

  
"Okay, so, wow, that story's real? Thanos, some alien guy, snapped his fingers and wiped out half the *universe*? Not just earth, but everywhere?" Foggy blurted out.

Hawkeye nodded. "That's what we were working with - that everyone was *gone*, not that they could be somewhere else. We've got aliens consulting with us - more than Thor - and from what they've seen of the returned folks, the four variations - "

"Blinks, Claws, Fins and Wings," Peter named off for clarity. Foggy liked the kid but he could tell he was only a couple of questions away from starting a flow chart. Foggy was leaning more toward the strings and push-pins.

"Right," Clint smiled. "Out of _those_ , only the Blinks seem to have been actually removed from existence - Danvers says it varies by 'species', but small selections, say, a couple of million a piece, were transplanted to planets where the snap would cause near-extinction events but the inhabitants had compatible DNA. Places where some of the universe's - shit, I don't want to say it."

Foggy frowned. "Cats, fish and birds?"

"Pets," May said flatly. "Like Karen and Marci said - right?"

"Are you _shitting_ me?" Frank snapped.

"Wait - full extinction events - did we kill an entire species of alien?" Foggy processed. "Oh God, what if we're smallpox - "

"Pause, it's not like that," Sam held up his hands.

Matt leaned forward. "You're lying."

Clint snickered aside to Sam before speaking to Matt. "He does that, Sammy, - but he's not lying. Just like with humans, those 'kind' of aliens were scattered around, too. Not all the Claws came from your location - humans got picked because we're easy to cross-breed."

Peter flinched suddenly and turned to his aunt. "No, _not_ to cross-breed, to modify and splice - like, I might have spider DNA but that doesn't mean I can make spider babies - Aunt May - don't get that look, you're not going to have kittens - "

Sam held up his hand. "Can we back up a second? Why would you be _smallpox_?"

"We were some kind of...zoo exhibit?" Marci interrupted.  "Fuck - because our place - planet, whatever - they weren't trying to fuck us.  They'd hunt us, catch us and pluck us - but they didn't _kill_ us, just let us go until our feathers grew back. They were giants, none of our weapons could touch them and Colleen has a magic sword. They were - huge. Bigger than Hulk, like, but not as big as the Ant-Guy on max."

" _What's that dude's deal anyway, did he get bitten by an Ant?_ " Danny murmured from the back until Colleen hushed him.

"We weren't on exhibit, I hope," Frank said darkly. "But it would explain why the city was set up in a way we would recognize."

Jessica shifted. "Think about it. They dosed humans with Alien Cat juice, and the assholes that were there with us looked identical to humans, but spoke a different language with a different social structure. They were Alien Cats dosed with _human_ juice."

"So it was fine that we killed them all?" May asked slowly.

Clint and Sam glanced at each other.

"Survival," Frank said, maybe appealing to the soldier-side of their superheroic guests. "If they found one of us, unbonded, untethered - they'd try to claim us and breed us. From the moment we got there to the moment we killed them - they didn't get the 'humanity' part of the human juice."

"We poisoned them," Foggy said, needing to explain before they got arrested for alien genocide. "Sure, the Trio killed a ton of them before we got a plan together - but we couldn't - live that way, not forever, not 1825 days."

" _Oh my God, you knew the number, too? This whole thing is so weird_ ," Danny called out.

Sam gestured widely. "That's an answer we know - the wizard's team sent out a warning, a _'keep calm and carry on_ ' kind of thing but he forgot to add the context - if he even knew the context."

"Danny? Anything to add about the Fins?" Foggy asked, needing to move on from the thought of Avengers' level jail. 

Danny leaned over the back of the couch to be part of the circle instead of second row. "We didn't get chased or - _bred_ \- we were just underwater. Same day-night cycle of light and dark, we just could never reach the surface. There were a lot of larger _creatures_ , but they didn't eat us, they just...swam by?  Talking was complicated so we used a version of ASL.  We used these weird heating vents to cook our food, being a vegetarian was totally helpful but - it was oddly peaceful compared to you guys."

"Because you were in an aquarium," Clint said blankly.

Foggy leaned back. "This can't be right."

"We have to deal with it," Jessica said. "What happens now?"

"If we thought we were fucked before - it was _nothing_ compared to now. New World Order and who the fuck knows - " Clint sighed but Sam clamped his hand over his mouth.

"Not in front of the kid. Everything's going to be a mess for a while. Keep your heads down," Sam said.

"But not too far down," Clint said when he was allowed to speak again. "Eventually, someone will need to talk to you about those 1825 days."

Matt held up his hand. "Not it."

"Dude, not this again - " Frank growled.

"May and Foggy can speak for us. Their hands are clean," Jessica stated.

Clint made an encompassing motion with his hand at Jess, Frank and Matt. "You're the Trio he was talking about?"

"A, B and O," Matt shrugged.

"They killed most of the enforcers and then infiltrated the different levels we were grouped into," May said. Foggy glared at her. "They _just_ said I could speak for them, what did you want me to say?"

"We'll discuss that privately," Foggy said.  He needed to be thinking with Lawyer-brain, not Beta-brain.

Clint nodded. "Fair enough - for now we'll make a note that Spider-Man's handler is the Trio's handler, too, and leave the names out of it on paper."

"Thank you," Matt said, solemnly.  Foggy had questions about his familiarity with the fugitive hero.

"Marci can run point for our group, lawyer and shit," Trish shrugged with Karen's fist pump of agreement.

"Rand, you okay with being our contact for questions about the Fins?" Sam called out.

" _Nope - Malcolm's better for that, he did a whole census. I was in charge of perimeter defense and, well, farming_ ," Danny said.

"Don't knock farming, shit saves lives," Foggy said. "Jessica's friend Malcolm?"

Danny leaned into view again. "He recognized me from that whole Midland Circle thing so we stuck together. He's camping out in Brooklyn with some of the older 'Fins' and his girl. He'll be the spokesman for us if I text him the details with at least four hours notice."

Sister Maggie rapped her knuckles on the counter in the kitchen. "I'll get you the appropriate numbers, we've almost worked out homes for everyone near where they used to live," she announced, bringing the meeting to a close.

Foggy had *so many* questions about Matt's goodbye bro-hug with Hawkeye but Karen caught his attention when he walked the pair of Avengers out.

"Okay, so I've gotta ask - what is this fund your family used to get us apartments?"

"Elektra left Matt shit-tons of money that he never touched. It passed to me and then to Mom and Dad when they filed papers on us as MIA," Foggy whispered.  Matt refused to discuss it so he hoped the bastard was distracted. "Maggie and Mom came up with the idea of a fund for the missing.  Theo got his real estate license and started picking up property all over town, just in case, and to keep up the rent for families with suddenly halved-incomes and it turned into a whole movement for people that were convinced the dusted would come back."

Sister Maggie nodded as she straightened up the scattered cushions and bottles. "Anna, Bess and I headed up things locally. Thought it would be a better use of the money than another memorial or statue. We were prepared for * **our** * people to come back, now we're fielding calls from everyone else."

"I can pay back what you used of Matt's money - " Danny started but Matt hissed sharply as he returned. Foggy wondered if that was going to keep happening.

"It wasn't _my_ money. Stop saying it was _mine_. Sister Maggie, I need - do you have a moment?"

She followed him out of the room and everyone else followed them with their eyes.

"I didn't mean to upset him," Danny said.

Peter shifted under his aunt's arm and shit - Foggy kept forgetting the spider was here. "Pretty sure that's not about you. They're praying. I think he knew Natasha."

"Black Widow?" Jessica asked.

"She didn't make it," Peter whispered. "That's not public knowledge, at least, nobody told me out loud - I don't think we're supposed to talk about it."

"No wonder he started drinking before lunch," Foggy murmured.

"There's nothing wrong with day-drinking," Jessica said.

 

* * *

 

  
"Okay, it took _entirely_ too long for us to make this happen," Matt said, splayed across Frank's chest with Jessica laying across his legs in a tangled heap.

Frank's laugh rippled through his back, oversensitive from the extended session started in the shower, then the bed and finally the floor. "Your mom's the one that made your apartment into home base."

"His mom's also the one that made sure he had an apartment," Jessica added lazily. "That made sure _all_ our friends have apartments."

"Can we stop talking about my Mom now?" Matt asked but he buzzed with warmth from the bond.  They didn't dare risk this kind of indulgence on the Other Side.

"Did you see her face when Foggy told her that me and you didn't need new apartments?" Jessica asked Frank with a tangible grin. She traced a line down Matt's ribs and Frank - _the most ticklish Beta ever_ \- giggled from the transfer. The first thing they mastered about the Trio bond was how to handle the balance of the mixed instincts. Shared pain would have been a _problem_ , but shared pleasure - was a gift.  The pack bondand the empathic link had been indispensable in an alien world without cell phones or safety promised by Earth.

Matt slid over on the blankets and looped his hand around Frank's neck, pulling him in to taste his laugh. "Why would you do that to poor Fogs?"

"Because he's everybody's favorite," Jessica notched her legs into place around his thigh so she could steal kisses from them both.

"He called like, ten times on the answering machine in the other room," Matt confessed. "Karen and Trish are trying to get Marci to approve a press tour for them."

Frank pushed his hand into Matt's hair with a sigh. "You can't turn those ears off when we're having private time?"

"You should know better than that by now," Jessica laughed.

Matt hummed into Jessica's shoulder, purr rumbling from that new place deep in his chest. "I'm not listening to outside - the sirens, the chatter - it's so fucking * _home_ * that I can't handle it."

"Better get used to it," Jessica and Frank mumbled together and Matt smiled.

 

* * *

 

  
"Congratulations on the promotion, Chief Mahoney," Matt greeted Brett after Bess, Anna and Maggie made an appearance and immediate exit. He wasn't sure what to expect but he wasn't going to wake Jess or Frank until he figured it out.

"Didn't want it the way I got it," Brett replied with a weariness Matt didn't remember from 5 years ago. "Everything in here's off the record, right?"

"Sure?"

Brett nodded. "The force has been fighting an uphill battle for the past few years but we finally - mostly - had things under control. The last couple of nights have been - problematic. Off the record - it's more than my team can handle and nobody needs them to call martial law again, be glad you missed that clusterfuck."

"Coffee?" Matt asked. "Is it seriously bad enough that you're - "

Brett sighed. "Just thinking it might be nice to let the public know the Devil's back in town, but I'll deny it until the day I die. You got backup now, right?"

"You probably won't like it, but yeah," Matt said.

"I don't need to know - the less I know, the better," Brett waved him off. "But I'd like you and me to be on the same page."

"What page is that?"

Brett accepted the mug Matt pushed across the counter for him. "The prison population doubled overnight - don't know if the Avengers factored that into the equation - but I've got all my uniforms loaned out to Rikers, and the rest working 80 hour weeks - I don't have the staff to patrol - "

Frank stepped out of the room but he was only wearing socks and not boots so Matt didn't think he was pulling a runner. "We had some of your guys on the Other Side with us, why not give them their badges back?"

"Bureaucracy," Brett replied without reacting to The Punisher apart from what sounded like a double take but no jump in pulse. Things must have been rough for the guy to stay so unruffled or else Frank was going soft. "Can't do it on the record and most of our neighborhood watches turned into militias by Year 3 and moved the fuck out."

" _Luke_ _says Harlem's a war zone, I already promised them backup_ ," Jessica called from the back.

Brett grumbled under his breath. "Harlem's got their own people."

"You said the less you know the better, so we'll discuss that later."

Brett drained the coffee in three gulps and placed something on the counter as he stood up. "You know how to work that, Castle?"

"Yeah, police scanners haven't changed. Channels?"

"I don't need - " Matt started.

"It's so you'll know which calls we aren't able to follow up," Brett cut him off. "Can you handle that?"

"I'll handle the radio, you put your number in his phone," Frank directed.

Jessica walked out. "Can you put it in mine? Misty's doing the same thing with her NYPD contacts and we've got a guy in Queens that's prepped to tag in for his borough."

"Viva la resistance," Matt said.

"Whatever you say," Brett replied after a beat. "This is temporary, okay?"

"This conversation never happened," Matt agreed.

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woot! A whole square! \o/ 
> 
> I will revisit this, perhaps. I'm thinking maybe I can fill some more squares in this 'verse now that it came together the way I wanted. Hybrid shenanigans!
> 
> I am still unhealthily upset about Endgame but this was fun. Thanks for indulging my crack tangent and for all the kind comments and kudos!

**Author's Note:**

> Title & chapter tags belong to _Brand New_ \- "137".
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> _So have you ever been in a car accident and you step out of the car onto the pavement, the sun's really bright and you're all tingly because you almost died and traffic's still buzzing and your head's just sparking off with 'omg my car my mom my insurance my neck my oh shit is that smoke omg' - that's how I felt walking out of Endgame. I need an extended moment._


End file.
